Commendation for the best retirement development
On stream
Beechcroft Developments likes to build its retirement developments near water, whether it is the sea, a lake, a river or – as here – a stream. And not just any stream, of course, but a mill stream, which is always the most evocative.
There was probably a watermill here at the time of the Domesday Survey. There was certainly one in 1830, for Pigot’s Directory for Cirencester shows John Lane as the miller in Barton Mill, and in Kelly’s Directory for 1889 Allen Brothers were the millers and corn merchants in Barton Mill.
There is no watermill today, but Barton Mill Place is located on the banks of the millstream, half a mile from the centre of Cirencester. Here are now 12 new three-bedroom cottages and four two-bedroom apartments for the over-55s, built of mellow Cotswold and designed by local architects, the Arbuthnott Ladenburg Partnership (or ALP Architects as they are now called), to complement the local vernacular style.
The cottages and apartments are designed in accordance with Beechcroft’s long-held principle of creating fewer rooms rather than less space (a variation on Mies van der Rohe’s dictum “less is more,” or in this case “fewer is more”). As most of Beechcroft’s buyers are well-heeled and trading down from large houses, what they want is plenty of space, and that is what they get.
At Barton Mill Place, a three-bedroom cottage has an ensuite bathroom to the master bedroom and a family bathroom for the other bedrooms, together with a proper drawing room, dining room, kitchen and downstairs cloakroom. A larger cottage also has a study, a sunroom and a private terrace. Similarly, the two-bedroom apartments have an ensuite bathroom and a family bathroom, a drawing room, a dining hall, separate kitchen and a private terrace. Two of the apartments also have a study. So these are retirement properties on a generous scale, and they have all been sold at prices from £315,000 to £440,000.
Kitchens have Optiplan units and Bosch appliances, while bathrooms have vanitory units, heated towel rails, mirrors and a pelmet light. Every property has gas-fired underfloor heating throughout. Each cottage has its own front garden, and a garage tucked away out of sight in a courtyard (where there is also a computer room with Internet access for residents).
All the private gardens and the landscaped communal grounds bounded by the millstream are maintained by the non-profitmaking Beechcroft Trust Every cottage and apartment is equipped with a personal alarm, a Lifeline telephone and a pendant transmitter linked to a 24-hour emergency monitoring system. There is an
administrative secretary on site to handle the day-to-day running and any emergencies.
This is luxury not all can afford
HomeBuilder: BEECHCROFT DEVELOPMENTS LIMITED
1 Church Lane, Wallingford, Oxfordshire OX10 0DX
Tel 01491 825522 Fax 01491 825433
Contact: Michelle Manester, Marketing Manager
Email: michellemanester@beechcroft.co.uk
Website: www.beechcroft.co.uk
Architects: ALP ARCHITECTS
15 Gosditch Street, Cirencester, Gloucestershire GL7 2AG
Tel 01285 641146 Fax 01285 641239
Contact: Richard Ladenburg, Partner
Email: mail@alparchitects.co.uk
Website: www.alparchitects.co.uk
Photography: JON FURLEY PHOTOGRAPHY (01420 83388)